The newest season of “The Amazing Race” premiers on Sunday, but I already know who gets eliminated first and who made some stumbles in the first leg.

Don’t worry: I’m not going to spoil the race for you here.

But the Associated Press has some egg on its face, because they’ve inadvertently told the world. About 2:20 p.m. today a story moved across my entertainment wire here at the Tribune (and every other news organization in the country) that detailed results of the first leg of the race, results that the public isn’t supposed to read or hear until Sunday night when the episode airs.

The story was intended to move across the wires Sunday evening, but someone must have pushed the wrong button and it went out on the wire today. As soon as I noticed it, I told my fellow editor, Susan Engle, to take a look because I wasn’t sure I was seeing correctly. She confirmed the giant boo-boo and then picked up the phone and called AP in New York to alert them to the gaffe. The response from the other end of the line can’t be printed in a family blog.

Moments later, the AP sent what they call a “bulletin kill.” Bulletins are reserved for the most important of stories, so a bulletin kill means the story must be deleted immediately and should not be published in any form.

Fair enough, but now my viewing of Sunday’s show is spoiled. Oh well. That’s just the price I pay for being in this line of work.

Anyone else who wants to be surprised Sunday night, however, might want to take care on what Web sites you visit over the weekend, because the news will be out there, that’s certain. Once that particular horse gets out of the barn, it’s impossible to shut it back inside again.

I just enjoy Mike and Mel on “The Amazing Race.” They are my favorite racers and Mel’s wry one-liner observations usually crack me up. I loved when they showed up at the travel agent office and announced, “We want the same thing they do” and how miffed Tammy looked. Hee!

I have my hate on for Jaime and Cara and how rude and mean they are. Actually, one of them is meaner than the other, but try as I might, I can’t tell them apart. One of them, however, is constantly harping on people to do her bidding or else and always seems to have something nasty to say about someone. So I was pleased to see them be the first to arrive at the herb shop and be the last to get their clue, except for M&M.

I thought Michael was pretty smart to throw all the tire pumps into the box, but apparently that was against the rules. That must be something that is spelled out earlier that we never get to see. (I remember Reuben in “Survivor” stealing everyone’s shoes and that was OK, so I guess some CBS game shows have stricter rules than others.) And I didn’t hear anything in the rules about not being able to hire someone to take them to the park in the rickshaw, but once I heard Tammy and Victor telling the driver they couldn’t follow him, I knew the brothers were toast.

Lucky for them, they had really done a pretty good job so they were well ahead of everyone else and ended up coming in third, which isn’t bad since they were second to last the week before. I keep thinking these guys can’t last much longer and then they do.

Tammy and Victor do seem like the team to beat, but they’ve been pretty dull since their long walk in the Hungarian countryside and Victor’s blubbering breakdown. Sigh … those were the days.

It was pretty scary when Margie passed out, but I felt especially bad for Luke who just seconds before had been so excited about coming in fourth and then was so worried about his mother. It turned out she just needed water and to get cooled down, so that was a relief.

But back to M&M: Mel is a pretty smart guy. He was the only one who figured out last week to use the big basket to carry the elephant food instead of the little water bucket and a few weeks ago, he was the only one who found the houses they had to “repair.” And this week on the boat barrel task, he immediately figured that they could fill buckets while at the same time lifting some of them up on top of the boat.

But why oh why did M&M go to the beach instead of to the zoo to look for the gorilla? I suppose it was just their luck to get a driver who didn’t know, but everyone else stopped and asked so I don’t know why M&M didn’t, especially when they saw all the other teams going off in another direction. And then when they found a guy who DID know where it was, they didn’t believe him. Amazing.

And that mistake of not getting to the zoo was what did them in. The race will be a sadder one without those two.

Well, well, well. The highlight of this episode of “The Amazing Race” definitely was seeing the Philiminator in his underwear. In the roadblock, one member of each team had to strip down to their underwear and run a bit of a race to the pit stop in super cold windy weather – it was 25 degrees. It was pretty funny but those runners must have been freezing. And Phil intro’d the bit by stripping down to his skivvies for a quick shot. That’s the sign of a devoted host.

This leg was in Sibera and for the detour, racers could either drive a snowplow through an obstacle course or they could drive a bride to her wedding. Both teams who chose the brides had trouble and ended up coming in second to last and last. Let that be a lesson to racers: Stay away from the weddings.

Christie and Jodi, one of the two teams to choose the brides, ended up last but lucky for them, it’s a non-elimination round. These two were first last week, so they’ve taken a tumble.

Lakisha and Jennifer also drove the brides and ended up second to last. They had trouble with the standard transmission in the car. I can’t imagine someone going on AR without knowing how to drive a standard, just like I can’t imagine someone going on “survivor” and not knowing how to start a fire with flint. Watch and study, people!

Anyway, I hope those two can move up because I want them to stay in. Their banter while they drove their bride around town, struggled with the gears and the crazy Siberian traffic made me laugh. Keeping their cool should help.

Margie and Luke came in first. These two are strong racers and work well together as a team, though Luke’s penchant for meltdowns when things don’t go his way could still hurt him.

I’m not sure how Mark and Mike, the stuntman brothers, continue to stay in the race but they seem to just keep plugging along in the middle of the pack. As the race goes on, though, that middle of the pack is going to keep shrinking, so they need to step up their game if they want to stay in.

Mike and Mel provided some levity when Mike chose to run his skivvie race in big, heavy boots. That had to have added some time. Mel didn’t complain once about strained groins or anything, so that was also good.

Victor is so upbeat now, I can’t believe it’s the same guy. He’s almost giddy as they run around and sounds a bit like a 13-year-old as he exclaims his excitement. This was the same guy who was sobbing in the woods a couple of weeks ago. AR truly has some highs and lows.

Cara and Jaime were miffed at Victor and Tammy for running away from them instead of sticking around to help, but they should realize it’s getting awfully late in the race for teams to stay so chummy.

Anyway, that’s what I think. What do you think?

I was surprised when the flight attendants cruised to a relatively easy win in this week’s “The Amazing Race.” I think there’s been a different team in first every week, which makes for a much more balanced race and the notion that anyone of them can win it. That makes for more interesting viewing.

Wood-stacking task: Stuff like that would be daunting to me so I give major dap to anyone who completed the task. My heart sank (right along with theirs) when a couple of the stacks collapsed. And where did they find all the Siberian people who were partying at that task? They all looked like they were having a great time, but those men just wanted to grope the women racers. Nice.

Home improvement task: This task brought us the best line of the night by Mike when he said they looked like a “caravan of idiots” walking around the town with their window parts looking for the houses that needed repair. I am certain it’s very different when you’re in the race, but how in the heck could they miss those very visible signs on the fences in front of the houses that said the houses needed repair? I don’t get it. Mike had it exactly right.

The Blind U-Turn: Why does everyone whine about people playing by the rules of this game? I can see being ticked when someone hides another racer’s belongings or something like that but using this race feature is nothing to be ashamed about. If you’re good enough to get to the U-Turn first, you get to throw a wrench in someone’s game and U-turning Amanda and Kris was smart because those two were strong. I did like how A&K, when they found they’d be U-turned, didn’t come unglued and pitch a temper tantrum. They went back, built their wood pile and raced on, knowing they were toast. Very nice.

The best of the rest: I like brothers Michael and Mark but if those two make it bumbling their way through another week, I’ll be surprised. At someone point people are going to stop helping them and then they’ll be in trouble.

My favorite racers are turning out to be father-son team, Mel and Mike. They make me laugh nearly every week. I don’t think Mel has the physical stamina to make it much further, though. I’ll be sad to see them go.

Lakisha and Jennifer are another team I can see going far. They’re strong and could finish well.

Margie and Luke are going to be in trouble if Luke doesn’t quit whining and get down to the tasks. While he was trying to spell Chekhov, he kept quitting and whining to his mommy and it wasn’t pretty. He finally buckled down and just started going at the letters systematically and that saved the day. He’ll have to get a grip on his frustrations or they’ll be gone.

Big brother Victor and his incredible stubbornness and insistence that he is right, even in the face of overwhelming evidence presented by little sister Tammy that he is wrong, wrong, wrong are the stars of this episode of “The Amazing Race.”

And boy, how much did Tammy know they were on the wrong path when they were searching for those darn coffins? (Great task, by the way.) Tammy repeatedly said, between pants as they climbed a mountain, the route markers are always a red and yellow arrow, and she was right and Victor was wrong, wrong, wrong. There’s nothing more frustrating than to KNOW something is wrong and not be able to get on the right path. I really felt for her when Victor kept insisting he was on the right track. (I do wonder what all those red and white markers were there for.)

When Victor finally decided he was wrong, he’s sort of snotty about it (literally, because he kept sniffling while doing their tasks) and almost makes it seems like it’s somehow Tammy’s fault: “OK, let’s go back down if you want to.” That guy has issues. I hope he gets his humble on and stops being an ass. Tammy was being much nicer in return than Victor deserved. They were lucky Brad and Victoria missed their flight because that was the only thing that kept them in the game.

Brad and Victoria screwed up at the airport and got so far behind, it was a lost cause. That was pretty sad, because of the futility of their race so early in the show. But dang, finishing up that vampire challenge, Brad must have been slamming those boards onto the stake because he was just covered in whatever was passing for blood by the time he was done. They didn’t get much screen time, I suppose because they weren’t screaming and yelling and pitching tantrums over their misfortune. Their story must have been deemed too uninteresting to waste much time on and now they’re gone.

Other than that drama, I liked Mel & Mike coming in first. They work well together. Tammy and Victor seemed unstoppable but it’s hard to say after this week’s mess.

Finally, you’d think, after watching what happened last season with lost passports and money, Amanda and Kris would have had an iron grip on that stunning AR fanny pack. I realize fanny packs are far from high fashion these days, but would it kill the racers to just wear the stupid thing throughout a leg? If someone has to take it off (for things like the gymnastics task), the other one can just put it on. That thing should never be detached from a body except when making the transfer. If it’s lost, all is lost.